HST Image of Saturn: February 24, 2009 12:12 UT
Saturn
The semi-major axis of Saturn's orbit about the sun is 9.5 astronomical units (A.U.) or roughly 1.4 billion km.
The planet (without rings) has a diameter of roughly 75,000 miles (120,000 km) at the equator.
The Hubble images and videos were created from HST data from proposal 11956: K. Noll, Z. Levay, M. Mutchler, L. Frattare, C. Christian, F. Hamilton, and H. Bond (The Hubble Heritage Team/STScI/AURA). B. Januszewski (STScI), M.H. Wong (UC Berkeley/STScI), and C. Go (Phillipines) also helped with image conception, proposal preparation/processing and data analysis.
F439W (B), F555W (V), and F675W (R)
The image is a composite of separate exposures made by the WFPC2 instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. Three filters were used to sample broad wavelength ranges. The color results from assigning different hues (colors) to each monochromatic image. In this case, the assigned colors are:
Blue: F439W (B)
Green: F555W (V)
Red: F675W (R)
NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA);
Acknowledgment: M.H. Wong (STScI/UC Berkeley) and C. Go (Philippines)